Posted
by
Unknown Lameron Monday June 04, 2012 @07:40PM
from the the-stock-market-has-always-been-up dept.

New submitter Vulcan195 writes "Now this is amusing in so many ways ... Today (June 4, 1989 ... i.e. 6/4/89) is the 23rd anniversary of the Tiananmen Square crackdown. Naturally, the Chinese Censors were working overtime to block anything that made remote or oblique references to that event. Well, sometime during the day the Shanghai Composite Index dropped by 64.89 points; You can guess what happened next."

Every discussion of Chinese censorship inevitably leads to posts about how the USA should get off it's high horse because it is just as bad. It is true that the USA has committed atrocities. Kent State, Jim Crow killings, Dresden, etc. The difference however, is that the USA reflects on its past in a much more transparent way than China does today. Come on China, it has been 23 years. Let's discuss this in an open way. You won't be able to hide it forever, especially because most Americans saw a lot of Tiananmen on TV.

What the fuck are you talking about? It's insane what people think war is today. War is horrible, awful, terrible. All assets of a country you are at war at are legitimate targets. Babies, puppies, little old ladies. Anything that would stop the German people from trying to rule the world was a legitimate target. Imagine if the Nazis had won the war... Whole races of people could have been wiped off the face of the earth. Imagine if we had taken another 6 months to a year to defeat them and they had come up with their own atomic weapon and dropped it on London...

The very idea that there are "rules of war" is just stupid. War crimes are what the winners of a war charge the leadership of the losers so they can execute them in some semi-legal way.

The rules of engagement that the US military exercises are a token effort made by our leadership because our military is so ridiculously over equipped and the enemy is usually so completely out-classed that it costs us relatively little to avoid some of the more publicly distasteful practices. I promise you, if we ever got into a war with an enemy that was even remotely evenly matched to our military our rules of engagement would be out the window in a heartbeat. Would you shoot some strangers baby in the face if the alternative was that he would shoot your baby in the face? Of course you would. Now shut the fuck up.

1) Win. Do this in whatever way is necessary to preserve as much of your side as possible.2) The winners decide how it gets written in history. They're in charge. They are the feel good side, and they dictate how the losers pay for what they did.3) War criminals are the ones who lost. They got what they asked for. This is the true leadership risk of waging war. If you're the Generalissimo, and you lose, it's your head both figuratively and literally. The soldiers who survive may be tried, but the leaders will most certainly be.3a) If you welcome the winners with open arms, you're more likely to be in good shape even if you're on the losing side... Assuming the tide doesn't turn and you end up a traitor.3b) If you fight to the bitter end and lose... It's the bitter end.

Rules of engagement are an attempt to preserve the non-fighting population who will presumably welcome the victors with open arms. I believe it's more of an attempt to maximize follow-up stabilization attempts.

Yes, this is an over-simplification. Please understand that tongue is firmly planted in cheek, even if there's a bit of truthiness in there.

Bullshit. Even the leaked videos from war crimes and outright murder of civilians and reporters from the US military in recent wars has done nothing. These incidents will soon be forgotten. The only thing that will remain will be the official "truth". People don't want to see criminal acts committed by "their troops". They'll hail to the flag and pretend everything is righteous as fuck.

An important lesson in warfare was learned in the aftermath of the Treaty of Versailles was that you do not crush your defeated enemy completely - unless you are prepared to make them extinct. Sure, win at all costs but then make sure there is an operating country left.

10 years after WW I Germany was a wreck and this led directly to the rise of Hitler and WW II.

10 years after WW II both Germany and Japan had strong economies and a great deal of rebuilding had been done. Neither Germany nor Japan was "crushed" from their defeat and in many ways Japan's society improved a great deal. The average man on the street probably came out better because of how Japan was managed post-war than if the war had never happened. All traces of feudalism were wiped out of the country whereas before many had persisted.

I'd say the other approach that works was Carthage which we have not seen the likes of since - burn everything to the ground, salt the fields so nothing grows there and kill everyone - men, women, children, dogs, everyone. If you aren't prepared to go that far, it is necessary to leave a functioning country after defeat.

This is one problem with Iraq and Afganistan. Iraq was a functioning country but it was crushed almost completely. Afganistan post-Taliban could probably be said not to have been a functioning country even before being invaded. In both cases failure to leave a functioning country will almost certainly result in more wars.

Another reason that the US military "limits" itself with rules of war is that their leadership recognizes that the US has to keep existing in the political climate after a war. If the US military just went about steamrolling across Afghanistan/Iraq with no concern for civilians there would be huge political repercussions with possible sanctions as a result, not exactly what the US economy needs at the moment.
Another obvious complication with a "real" war is that it would with 100% certainty trigger WWIII and the obliteration of mankind as the countries capable of fighting on similar terms is pretty much limited to Europe, Russia, China, India, Japan and maybe few others and any actions against any one of those nations would trigger a chain reaction that would eventually pull every major industrialized nation into the war.

Actually you miss the elephant in the room. The US is so vastly powerful they could steam roll any country (at the moment) provided: a) they thought it was worth doing (Afghanistan and Iraq did not mobilize all US forces available - so no, these are not in the same category as a WWII Total War); b) a substantial fraction of the US population was prepared to make sacrifices to win, and c) the US Government thought the benefit of fighting was enough to pay for it.

Iraq was won with a small fraction of available US forces and zero conscription (it just wasn't needed), and Afghanistan actually has mostly been won apart from drug-money and Pakistan (ISI and Haqqani) backed remnants of a insurgency. It is fairly clear that the US achieved their aims (kill Osama, destroy afghan terrorist camps, install friendly government) and doesn't feel the need to do much more (doesn't need to turn Afghanistan into a modern European-style civilized country, since the Afghans themselves are not really into this). So yeah, the US doesn't feel the need to commit in a total way to these fights - but it easily could have if it had *really* wanted to (Internet or no Internet). The truth is the US/Pentagon doesn't really care anymore, but don't make the mistake as thinking it is the same as not having the capability if they actually did get fighting mad.

Iraq was won with a small fraction of available US forces and zero conscription (it just wasn't needed), and Afghanistan actually has mostly been won apart from drug-money and Pakistan (ISI and Haqqani) backed remnants of a insurgency. It is fairly clear that the US achieved their aims (kill Osama, destroy afghan terrorist camps, install friendly government) and doesn't feel the need to do much more (doesn't need to turn Afghanistan into a modern European-style civilized country, since the Afghans themselves are not really into this). So yeah, the US doesn't feel the need to commit in a total way to these fights - but it easily could have if it had *really* wanted to (Internet or no Internet). The truth is the US/Pentagon doesn't really care anymore, but don't make the mistake as thinking it is the same as not having the capability if they actually did get fighting mad.

Yes and look where the costs of that limited war got you, it nearly bankrupted the government. The costs of committing to a war that would require conscription would increase those costs exponentially because not only do you have to pay for all the weapons and equipment you're deploying, you are also depriving the industry of necessary manpower(probably base industry manpower because the first to be drafted is usually males with little to no education).

Bullshit! Israel has had both nukes and conventional forces that could have attacked the Iranian programme for the last decade. They have chosen not to - instead giving time for diplomatic means until it is nearly too late. What the Israelis have been pointing out is that the Iranian nuclear weapon programme (for which more and more evidence getting uncovered as time goes on) is not an Israeli problem, it is in fact a threat to the whole World (which the rest of the World actually agrees with, finally). The Israelis have been making a lot of noise not because they want to start a war - it is because the US and Europeans are too damn apathetic to do anything about Iran apart from hand wringing. The Israelis don't want war, but they don't want Iran to be able to threaten them (and the Middle East, and Europe) with nukes either.

All assets of a country you are at war at are legitimate targets. Babies, puppies, little old ladies.

And yet both sides on the Western Front in Europe managed to abide more-or-less by the Geneva convention. They fed and sheltered captured enemy troops, when it would have been more efficient to simply shoot them. In that sense, it wasn't a total war: they still followed rules to mitigate the worst effects of war on the human condition.

That's why we can claim the moral high ground when someone flies an aircraft into a building filled with thousands of civilians. And why we'll lose it, if we ever do the sa

One thing that often does not get mentioned in these discussions of world war ii is what the allies demanded as conditions for peace. The plan was to put all the german men in forced labor camps, destroy all institutions of higher learning, and redistribute the land to the neighboring countries. These were the British demands for peace made public in an editorial in the times of London 2 days after the declaration of war. The allied plan got eventually formalized as the morgenthau plan, with a demand for unconditional surrender (as in give up your weapons and no guarantees are made).

No matter whether things seemed to go in favour or against the allies, they never retreated from these demands until 2 years after the end of the war.

If you put as conditions for peace terms that are not beneficial for either the leaders or the people of a country, and every choice that they have favors continuing to fight, you have taken the responsibility from their hands into yours.

One thing that often does not get mentioned in these discussions of world war ii is what the allies demanded as conditions for peace.

No. World War II in Europe has one of the clearest reasons for starting of any war.

The cause of the war has nothing to do with the conditions of surrender. It is entirely possible for both claims to be true: that both the start of the war was legitimate, and the conditions of surrender many years later were unacceptable.

Would you shoot some strangers baby in the face if the alternative was that he would shoot your baby in the face?

Can you explain how shooting a baby in the face will keep anyone from shooting yours? For that matter, how is shooting puppies or little old ladies going to help you win? It won't. If anything it just inspires the enemy. Which gets us to why "rules of war" exist: wars are extremely stressful situations, which cause people fighting in them to do unnecessary or even counterproductive cruelties. Rules of war and rules of engagement exist to try to prevent the more outrageous of these.

Now shut the fuck up.

Do you have some kind of personal stake here? Because you seem to be getting pretty emotional about the topic.

There are rules to war. There were plenty of rules that were mostly followed by both sides in WW2.

If you break the rules, more of them may fight you to the death than surrender. For example there is no point surrendering if you are breaking the rules and killing prisoners that surrender. Then even if you eventually win, it would cost you a lot more.

You want to wage a war where the enemy is more likely to surrender than fight you to the bitter end.

The rules of war are put in place not for the enemy, but exist for us. War is an inhumane thing. It is antithetical to our very nature.

Rules of engagement make it easier for us, the everyday people, to stomach. This both applies to the civilian population, and the grunts on the ground. If the acts committed during war becomes too atrocious for people to stomach, public sentiment turns against it, soldiers begin defecting. Vietnam was the perfect example of a conflict nobody except the sociopaths in charge wanted to continue.

Of course, this really only applies for those who are aggressors. The U.S. has not been in an existential war for at least 150 years. Every war since the Civil War has been fought on foreign soil, or in the open waters. Every threat has been to safety and security, but never to existence. Therefore, since there is nothing really at stake anyway, the U.S. can set rules.

In fact, had the Civil War been purely north vs. south, winner-take-all, all bets would've been off. As it were, the conflict was actually over the right to secede, making it a war over an ideology as opposed to territory or extermination. Even so, the atrocities committed during that war make Vietnam pale in comparison (though Vietnam was a special kind of hell for different reasons).

You are possibly assuming there a degree of targeting accuracy which they didn't have. Also, many historical building had military import (such as historic railway stations used for moving supplies). Keep in mind in World War II, the accuracy of bombing was so poor that they sometimes bombed the wrong city. If you had a factory or the like in the middle of an area, that wasn't going to help. The more serious problem with Dresden was that arguably they really were targeting civilians. There is some complexity involved though- it isn't clear that the laws of war had yet reached a consensus at that point. See http://www.icrc.org/eng/resources/documents/misc/57jpcl.htm [icrc.org] for some relevant points. There's a decent argument also that the presence of factories and the presence of military units stationed in and around Dresden made it a legitimate target. George Marshall made an inquiry that came to that conclusion, but the fact that the US military thought an inquiry was necessary does reflect strongly on the questionable nature of the decision. The argument that the bombing was not justified has been most strongly argued by Alexander McKee who is a historian who has written a fair bit on this subject. Overall, I'd say that McKee's analysis is a strong but not convincing case (although this is also going off my memory of the last time I looked into this subject in detail which was around 5 or 6 years ago).

"The more serious problem with Dresden was that arguably they really were targeting civilians."

Same as Coventry. Difference being Churchill knew about the attack thanks to intercepted messages but had to let it happen so the Germans didn't know we had cracked their codes. That incentive for revenge, plus the fact that Dresden was pretty much the only large city not yet hit made it a pretty tempting target.

There is only one person who has ever claimed that Churchill knew that Coventry was the target of the raid you are referencing. The more credible claim by other sources is that Churchill knew that an attack was coming but believed that the target was London.

Keep in mind in World War II, the accuracy of bombing was so poor that they sometimes bombed the wrong city.

Dressden was systematically fire bombed, they diliberately created a huge fire in the center of the city with incendery bombs. It was so large it created it own weather with hurricane strength winds on the outskirts of the city sucking fuel, oxygen, and people into the central furnace. In terms of indescriminate carnage it had the same effect as an atomic bomb, but over a 2 day period.

Apologists for this atrocity will continue to point to the few factories and soldiers in what was essentially a university city where the population were largely opposed to Hitler. Large scale atrocities were commited by boths sides during WW2 that's just basic history, the 'stanford prison experiment' gives us a glimpse as to why we have been repeating that kind of history for thousands of years.

No matter how you spin it, the fire bombing of Dresden and subsequent incineration of 250K civilians was an atrocity that should not have happened, nearly every historian agrees it made no military sense. Face facts, it was an immoral and spiteful target by anyone's standards, you just need to grow up and accept that we can be (and often are) every bit as 'evil' as our percieved enemies, (and I offer the fact that you consider Dressden a 'valid target' as proof of that last claim).

..such, "grossly inflated" casualty figures have been promulgated over the years, many based on a figure of over 200,000 deaths quoted in a forged version of the casualty report, Tagesbefehl No. 47, that originated with Hitler's Reich Minister of Propaganda Joseph Goebbels.

No, they did not. By then, Japanese were already trying to find a way to surrender. Americans wanted to be the ones who dictated the condition for surrender, even though the conditions they imposed were exactly the same as ones Japanesed proposed to begin with. In other words, the whole thing was entirely to humiliate Japanese (and to threaten the rest of the world).

According to this article [wikipedia.org] the Japanese always planned on getting a negotiated ending to the war. In a sense one might say that the Japanese were already trying to find a way to surrender[1] even as they were dropping torpedoes on Pearl Harbor.

Americans wanted to be the ones who dictated the condition for surrender,

Well, yeah. That's kind of the point to fighting a war--getting to dictate the terms. Japan wanted to dictate terms. America wanted to dictate terms. The Soviet Union wanted to dictate terms. Germany wanted to dictate terms. Great Britain wanted to dictate terms. France wanted to dictate terms. Morocco wanted to dictate terms. I wouldn't be surprised to learn that Côte d'Ivoire wanted to dictate terms.

even though the conditions they imposed were exactly the same as ones Japanesed proposed to begin with.

That's not correct. Terms the Allies insisted upon that were unacceptable to Japan included the elimination "for all time [of] the authority and influence of those who have deceived and misled the people of Japan into embarking on world conquest, the occupation of "points in Japanese territory to be designated by the Allies", Japanese sovereignty shall be limited to the islands of Honshu, Hokkaido, Kyushu, Shikoku and such minor islands as we determine, the Japanese military forces shall be completely disarmed, stern justice shall be meted out to all war criminals, including those who have visited cruelties upon our prisoners, and the unconditional surrender of all Japanese armed forces, and to provide proper and adequate assurances of their good faith in such action. The Japanese government rejected those demands as late as 27 July 1945.

In other words, the whole thing was entirely to humiliate Japanese (and to threaten the rest of the world).

That's not correct. While it's true that any country would find it humiliating to be forced to accept such terms, it's also true that merely having to surrender would be humiliating to a country who had never lost a war, which situation Japan found itself in prior to August 1945. All of the above terms and the simple fact of surrender, itself, had as their primary goal not to humiliate Japan, but rather to forestall the onset of World War III.

Whether someone can "complain" about something doesn't have much to do with whether it is moral. Just because another government is targeting your civilian population doesn't magically make it moral to target their civilians, especially when many of them aren't even in favor of the government in question.

If someone targets your civilians then they can hardly complain if you target theirs. The debate of whether it is moral or not should center on the first attack on civilians, not on second (since by the earlier attack the aspects of morality have already been waived).

That said, there is one country that still preserves human life even when its citizens have been deliberately targeted. That country is Israel. Islamic Radicals routinely rocket Israeli cities with the express purpose of killing civilians (a

It is a countries duty to police their politicians. If they are unable to hold them in check, they must suffer the consequences of the actions that those politicians take. It's a rough reality, but it is true.

That is exactly the same argument used by Osama bin Laden: bin Laden's 'Letter to America' [guardian.co.uk] justifies attacking civilians by stating that they are a complicit part in the American military actions abroad because they have chosen their government democratically, and pay taxes to fund their actions.

One can argue whether Dresden was or was not a legitimate military target, but even if it was, it doesn't automatically make targeting it justifiable. An ammo stash on the roof of a hospital is also a legitimate military target, but if the enemy is already crippled to the point where he is unable to use that stash to any meaningful effect, targeting it just because you can - with all the ensuing civilian casualties - is morally wrong.

For reference, by the time of Dresden firebombing, Soviet troops were already at Oder, within 50 miles from Berlin, for over a week. In fact, Soviets could have likely ended the war right there and then if they kept marching on; they just decided to play it safe.

Note that I didn't say that it's always wrong to strike military targets when there is a chance (or even a certainty) of collateral damage. There are certainly circumstances where that is the best available choice, and there are certainly more such circumstances in an all-out war such as WW2. This is something that has to be judged on a case by case basis. But when you disregard any thoughts about the morality of your actions, just because the victims belong to some abstract class titled "enemy" (even when in reality they are just scared kids), that's unequivocally evil.

If it makes me one of "them", whoever that is, then I'm in a good company.

Yes, but what's the purpose of war? It's not to kill the enemy, it's not to disable their infrastructure, it's not to reduce their ammunition supplies.

Clausewitz suggested the purpose is the imposition of your will on another. Killing civilians in this day and age reduces your chances of successfully imposing your will, so it's counter-productive, for all the damage you may cause to the enemy.

Since the Soviets had lost about TEN MILLION troops and the Germans were fighting desperately to buy time for refugees to evacuate, it wasn't just "playing it safe".

Soviets lost ten million troops in the first two years of the war. By February '45, the tables were decidedly turned. Heck, in the Vistula-Oder offensive, Germans had lost 150k people taken prisoner (and an uncertain amount, but certainly more, dead), for the Soviet 40k KIA + MIA.

Your priorities are revealing in that your only concern is for Germans.

I don't know what strawman you have built up as my priorities; it's especially puzzling to me since my off-tangent remark about the offensive you somehow took for the main point of my argument, and saw some priorities in it? There were certainly none implied.

Anyway, myself being Russian, and one of my grandfathers having fought in that war, I am most certainly biased - but not in the way you seem to imply. If you are trying to be offensive, you have certainly succeeded.

Germany had killed tens of millions of people. It's not sane to expect the countries they attacked to quibble over collateral damage. The whole premise of "war" is that "enemy" lives are worth less than "own side" lives and that it's absurd to sacrifice yours to save theirs.

Is it okay to sacrifice a thousand of "theirs" to save one of "yours"? Ten thousand? A million? At which point do you say it's enough?

Most certainly, the most efficient way to deal with Germany once and for all in 1945 would have been to massacre them completely - firebombings, artillery, whatever. No people, no problem, right? Why leave anyone alive if you know that any living German may be a Werwolf member who'll shoot you in the back as soon as you turn away?

Soooo, the attacks on the Pentagon and WTC were also legitimate targets? After all All Qaeda considers itself to be at "total war" with the United States(as well as a lot of other people/nations). Because from a military point of view there is absolutely no real difference(except that the firebombings was obviously on a much larger scale), The Pentagon is the headquarters of the US military(so arguably a legitimate military target under any circumstances) and the World Trade Center had considerable importa

Germany initiated WWII because The Treaty of Versailles that ended WWI was a failure. Violence breeds violence. Wars lead to more wars. Every war leads eventually to another war, only peaceful change puts an end to conflict.

and oh, i dont know, several thousand other high ranking nazis who got off scott free and had high positions in the post war society, because of the realpolitik of the cold war. but hey. whats a few thousand dead civvies, when the masters of the universe are deciding important questions of morality?

The bombings happened on different days. The Japanese had several days to surrender, which they didn't.

From wikipedia:Together with the United Kingdom and the Republic of China, the United States called for a surrender of Japan in the Potsdam Declaration on 26 July 1945, threatening Japan with "prompt and utter destruction". The Japanese government ignored this ultimatum, and two nuclear weapons developed by the Manhattan Project were deployed. Little Boy was dropped on the city of Hiroshima on 6 August 1945, followed by the Fat Man over Nagasaki on 9 August

The Japanese government still did not react to the Potsdam Declaration. Emperor Hirohito, the government, and the war council were considering four conditions for surrender --snip--The Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov had informed Tokyo of the Soviet Union's unilateral abrogation of the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact on 5 April. The senior leadership of the Japanese Army began preparations to impose martial law on the nation, with the support of Minister of War Korechika Anami, in order to stop anyone attempting to make peace . --snip--

Being transparent about one's past is certainly a good thing, but it's a pretty small consolation when atrocities keep going on.

The war in Iraq killed over a hundred thousand civilians - I have no doubt that in several decades, the USA will officially give REAL recognition to these victims (instead of blanket statements such as "we remember the victims of this war" which doesn't clearly spell out "CIVILIANS"). However, this won't make up for the fact that the war should have ended years earlier than it did (and in fact should have never been started).

I'd go as far as to say being transparent when you don't learn from your mistakes is pointless.

So sure, it's better than China. But not by much. The homeless man with two pennies is twice as rich as the one with only one penny - they still both have the same standards of living.

The war in Iraq killed over a hundred thousand civilians - I have no doubt that in several decades, the USA will officially give REAL recognition to these victims (instead of blanket statements such as "we remember the victims of this war" which doesn't clearly spell out "CIVILIANS"). However, this won't make up for the fact that the war should have ended years earlier than it did (and in fact should have never been started).

Except that the vast majority of those civilians were killed by people who had lost their power trying to get it back. Blaming the US for that is equivalent to blaming Abraham Lincoln for the KKK -- after all, if the slaves had never been freed, there wouldn't have been any reason for the southern whites to put them back in their place by terrorizing and killing them, right? And in both cases, those who had been overthrown (the Baathists or the slave owners) would have been killing their former subjects to

American interference in world affairs has -always- ended up bad for America and even worse for the rest of the world. Look at the Iran Iraq war where the US and UK allied themselves with Saddam's Iraq and supplied arms to them! The US (and other Western nations) prop up dictators and then later have to take them down in a perpetual war.

That's what, propaganda goal #3? #4? First it was 'training/harboring terrorists,' then 'weapons of mass destruction', then 'bringing democracy to the Middle East...' All nonsense used to justify an elective adventure that killed hundreds of thousands of innocent people, and liquidated the educated class of an entire country.

Sure, getting rid of Hussein was a good thing, but guess what? In the real world, you can't eliminate Hussein in a vacuum. You have to consider the possibility that one tin-pot dictator is not worth razing a country, killing hundreds of thousands of innocents including nearly all of the educated class, plus thousands of your own soldiers, and spending billions of dollars that could have helped immensely with the current financial crisis.

'US forces went out of their way to spill as little blood as possible?' No, the Bush administration rashly created the situation that led to the deaths of the Iraqis (most Democrats spinelessly went along with it). The Bush administration was full of Polyannas who thought that Iraq would be like the liberation of Paris. Rumsfeld created his own intelligence department because he didn't like the facts, then smugly dismissed any criticism with statements like "You don't go to war with the army you want, you go with the army you have" which is extremely disingenuous considering the elective nature of the war.

The most powerful people in the country had no plans beyond "overthrow Saddam" and little or no conception of history or politics in Iraq. They seemed to have no idea at all that there would be a civil war, or any strategies on how to fight it. That's tragic negligence.

thank you. you can't just go around trying to impose your own morals on every nation. at least with syria, the people of that country made the decision to oust their dictator. they were ready. it was the popular decision. when you try to force democracy on a nation, you risk the population not being ready to accept it. and without the support of the population, you end up in a protracted war with "insurgents". i'm pretty sure if someone decided canada was oppressing me and started dropping bombs to make my

The difference however, is that the USA reflects on its past in a much more transparent way than China does today.

Transparency must be why, after Vietnam, we stopped broadcasting live coverage of the war and made sure every embedded journalist turns in his/her footage to be edited for "homeland security" reasons prior to being sent in for publication.
Transparency is why we have our own Star Chamber now, where suspected terrorists are tried, convicted, and sentenced, in secret trials where they cannot see the evidence presented against them, nor offer testimony in their defense.
Transparency is why at the bottom of most google search results, is the phrase "In response to a complaint we received under the 'US Digital Millenium Copyright Act' we have removed n results."
And transparency is most certainly why the founder of Wikileaks found his assets frozen because of a request by Homeland Security to PayPal through extrajudicial means, and then we discovered a secret unit within Homeland Security who's sole purpose is to discredit citizens who express "politically undesireable" viewpoints.

We don't "reflect on our past" any more transparently than China does -- we just have a higher threshold before the government decides to assassinate someone they disagree with. A threshold, I might add, that's been on a downward trend for some time.

I'm not sure what percentage of people actually reflect on their past, and certainly it's not that prominent in the mainstream media. I think considerable amount of reflection does happen, though, and it isn't actively suppressed. There are a lot of critical books on the Reagan presidency that you can buy from Amazon or other major bookstores. There are books attacking the Vietnam War, the invasion of Grenada, the suppression of the Black Panthers, etc. You cannot buy similarly critical books in China, which seems like a key difference: it's not just that Chinese don't want to read books attacking the invasion of Tibet or the Tiananmen Square massacres, but that these books simply cannot be purchased in China even if you're one of the minority of people who does want to read about it.

In fact, not only are such critical books published in the United States, but I have taken taxpayer-funded university courses that assign them as required reading! Angela Davis is a tenured university professor at a state-run university. None of that kind of thing happens in China.

The U.S. could do a lot better, most nations could, but trying to compare civil rights in the U.S. and China is just apples and oranges. (And I'm a Canadian socialist who thinks of America as a country of right-wingnut gun-toting redneck rebels.)

Your government has a lot of control over the media (or the media owns the government) so you don't censor events as much as you flood opposition stories and cover-up the small details with courts and procedure. Occupy wall street was just as dramatic as Tiananmen square just instead of tanks they had police run around beating people up and pepper spraying them, and instead of disappearing protestors, they are locked up as criminals all under the watchful eyes of the news teams. Even now i know i hear 100 r

That's the beauty of it, good doctor. You can fight over censorship. You can't fight a mass of undereducated, brainwashed, misinformed, superstitious voters. After all, things must be the way they are because the public wants them that way. After all, it's what they voted for, and it's not like we haven't censored contrary opinions, so what you hear on the news must be genuinely fair and balanced.

The problem with "Occupy Wall-Street" was there is no ideological unity and some of the protesters simply were idiotic (same thing with the "Tea Party" movement, but at least that had ideological unity) you get some sane signs protesting the bailout and then you simply get some absolute moronic signs like the one saying "a job is a right". I'm sure the Tiananmen Square protesters were much the same way, but looking at it from a foreign perspective it is much easier to generalize.

One wonders just how long these ridiculous fossils from the Revolution are going to live. As generations grow older and are replaced by younger generations, you'd think that tolerance would increase and these childish attempts to control an individual's thought would pass away along with the intolerant. When this finally does happen, when the Chinese citizens are finally as free as those in the Western world... we're really going to see something. Speaking as an ugly american, Chinese individuals that make

Except the metric system has a decimal base, and all the disadvantages it entails (5 is pretty much a useless divisor). The consistency is quite advantageous, but there are much better bases, at least if you don't limit yourself to our particular numeral system.

Speaking of numeral systems, at the time when fish came out of the water there were several competing species of amphibians, some with 5 fingers, some with 4 fingers, even some with 8 fingers. Eventually, the 5-fingered species 'won' the competition and it became the ancestor of all terrestrial vertebrates. That's why all of them, from frogs to lizards to humans have 5 digits. Makes you wonder what would have happened if the 4 fingered species had won. With 4 fingers we would have developed the octal numera

There's something to be said for both big-endian dates (YYYY-MM-DD) and little-endian dates (DD-MM-YYYY). Big-endian dates sort automatically into chronological order. Little-endian dates deliver the most pertinent information (least likely to be obvious from context) first, so you don't have to read the whole date if you already know the year. The same applies to big-endian times (HH:MM) and little-endian times (MM:HH).

Middle-endian dates like MM-DD-YYYY are still meritless and perverse, though.

It was no accident, the Shanghai index fell 64.89 points and people starting blogging that since 6/4/89 was the date of Tiananmen massacre, the stock index coincided with the date, which is a particularly infamous one. The censors then blocked those people for discussing the massacre, which is verboten. The NYT [nytimes.com] has a more in depth article. Now, the fact that the stock market fell by that exact amount by closing (see here [yahoo.com]) might be an accident, but the censors were doing exactly their job, censoring people discussing the massacre. As the NYT points out, other stock markets have been hacked and this may have be the case here as well, or some other intentional act. The Chinese government is investigating and you may rest assured that we will likely never know what they find since that would draw attention to why they were investigating in the first place.